


Can't Let You Go

by forgivenessishardforus



Series: Post-season 3 [1]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Post-Season/Series 03, canonverse, fireside breakdowns and cuddling, season 4 speculation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-04
Updated: 2016-07-04
Packaged: 2018-07-20 03:19:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7388470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forgivenessishardforus/pseuds/forgivenessishardforus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Some truths are incontrovertible, impossible to ignore. That Bellamy Blake loves her is one of those truths.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Can't Let You Go

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by a conversation between rosymamacita and blyedeeks on tumblr.

She knew it the way she knew that morning would come, the way she knew clean water was essential to life, the way she knew when someone had lost too much blood to be saved. There are some truths that are incontrovertible, impossible to ignore. As undeniable as the fact that her lungs would continue to draw air, her heart would continue to pump blood, her feet would continue to march forward, day after day, as long as there was hope the world could still be saved.

So yes, she knew that Bellamy Blake loved her.

If she were to be asked how or when she knew, she wouldn’t know how to answer; the truth of it had dawned on her slowly, perhaps as slowly as the realization of it had dawned on him. Was it the careful look of blank indifference on his face when she asked him to risk his life going into the mountain? Was it the heartbreak in his eyes when she told him she was leaving, after the mountain had fallen? Was it the way he had brushed her hair away from her face and breathed her name when seeing her for the first time in three months? The way his voice had broken when he’d said, “You don’t know what you’re talking about” to Raven’s claim that he’d always been more devoted to her than to Gina? The way he’d held her to him on the beach like he was never planning on letting go again, or the way he’d grasped her fingers tightly and vowed to protect her?

It could have been any of those moments, or all of them, but the result is now, nearly two weeks after defeating ALIE, she knows that he loves her.

If she were to be asked if she loved him the same, she wouldn’t know how to answer; her heart was scarred, deformed to the point where if she took it out of her own chest and looked at it, she wouldn’t be able to recognize it for what it was. _Love_ means red blood slick across her fingers, it means green eyes closed in death; love is terrified screams and scorching fire and ringing in her ears, it’s four hundred people slumped unbreathing over their dinner plates.

She feels that maybe she’s incapable of love. She believes that she’s undeserving of it.

Perhaps the right thing to do would be to speak to Bellamy, to say, “There is someone out there much more deserving of your love, someone who can return it; I am not that person and I never will be.” But Bellamy has been hurt so many times—by his sister, who had left without a word and still hadn’t come back; by herself, who had left him and left him and left him—that she doesn’t think she can bear to break his heart. Not again.

And even if she can’t love him, Bellamy is more important to her than any other person, more important than her mother, even. He’s the one who’s stood beside her every step of the way, who has forgiven her when she didn’t deserve forgiving, who had killed the mountain with her simply so she wouldn’t have to bear it alone. He understands the things they went through keeping the hundred alive, that first month on the ground. He was the one who had made her realizing that doing something terrible didn’t mean that she herself was terrible.

So when she feels his eyes on her at dinner, she pretends not to notice. When he says her name in that pleading way—“Clarke…”—she pretends not to hear it. When his hand lingers for a second to long at her back, she doesn’t move away. When he needs holding, she holds him, and she too finds comfort in the strength of his arms. When he feels the need to talk—about Octavia, about what he did, about what they’ve done—she listens. When he doesn’t want to talk, she’s there anyway.

If she can’t give him her love, then she certainly owes him her friendship, in every way she can offer it. And, being Bellamy, he never asks for more; he accepts her friendship, accepts her silence, and stands at her side as staunchly as he ever had.

“He deserves better, you know,” Raven tells her quietly one night when they’re sitting by the fire. Bellamy is standing some distance away, guarding the camp, but his eyes flicker towards them every few moments. She can feel his gaze on his neck every time he looks.

“I know.” Words simply said, her eyes trained on the dancing flames.

“Then you shouldn’t string him along like this.” Raven sounds angry; she shakes Clarke shoulder until she pulls her eyes from the flames to look at her. “Look, when I loved Finn—” She takes a deep, shuddering breath. “When I loved Finn, I was so desperate for him to love me the way I loved him that I ignored the way he was looking at _you_. I let myself pretend that he loved me the way I needed him to, because I couldn’t deal with the heartbreak of him not. And he let me. He let me believe that.

“And God, it hurt even more to find out that he didn’t. That he had been lying to protect me. I felt completely betrayed by the only person I considered family. It sucked. And Bellamy deserves better than that. He doesn’t deserve to be betrayed by someone who matters so much to him. You need to let him know.”

She’s silent. Her eyes slide over to Bellamy, when she’s sure he’s not looking at her.

“Say something,” Raven urges her.

“I can’t.” The words are like glass: she speaks them softly, delicately, so that they don’t break in her mouth.

“Can’t what? Tell him yourself? I’ll do it for you but I’ll tell you right now, hearing it from me will hurt him much worse than hearing it from you.”

Biting her lip, she can only manage to shake her head. Tears are stinging her eyes. She wishes she could believe they were caused only by the smoke.

“Can’t what?” Raven asks again, voice gentler now. She puts her arm around Clarke’s shoulder, nudges her chin until she’s looking at her. “Can’t _what_ , Clarke?”

“Can’t let him go.” Spoken no louder than a whisper. She wishes she could take the words back the moment she says them because now they _exist_ , another incontrovertible truth she can’t ignore.

“Clarke, do you love him?”

“I can’t.” Her voice is so quiet that Raven has to lean closer to hear her over the crackling of the fire. “When I love people, they die.”

Wordlessly, Raven pulls her towards her, holding her close. Buried in her friend’s arms, the tears come in earnest now and Raven rocks them gently back and forth, hand running soothingly through her hair.

“Maybe you believe that’s true,” she murmurs after several moments have passed in silence, “but I can tell you it’s not. The truth is that people _die_ down here, all the time, whether it’s by a spear to the chest or by hitting their head too hard on a rock. Love doesn’t kill, Clarke, but it sustains. I hope you realize that one day, because you deserve it. And so does he.”

“I’m not ready,” she whispers into Raven’s shoulder.

“That’s okay. But when you are, you should tell him. He needs to know.”

She doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t know _what_ to say.

She can feel Bellamy’s eyes on her head, knows where he is before he sits down beside her. “Everything okay?” he asks quietly.

Pulling away from Raven, she wipes at her cheeks, sniffles. “Yeah. It’s just—”

“I need to go,” Raven says abruptly. “Something mechanical with the rovers I promised I’d look into.” Before either of them can protest she’s on her feet and limping hurriedly across camp.

They sit in silence after Raven’s gone. Bellamy doesn’t ask her what’s wrong; he knows that if she wanted to tell him, she would. But he sits with her, arm gently brushing hers, and they stare into the fire together.

She thinks over what Raven said, and wishes she could believe it. But thinking about love still causes something dark and cold to rear up within her and wrap itself around her heart and her lungs until she can’t breathe. It floods her with memories of Finn and of Lexa, the way they’d looked when she’d loved them, the way they’d looked when she’d kill them.

No, she’s still not ready; but maybe she can start getting there, one small step at a time.

Cautiously, she rests her head against Bellamy’s shoulder. She can sense him looking over at her in surprise.

“I’m glad you’re here,” she says quietly, words directed at the fire.

Just as cautiously, he lifts his arm from his side and wraps it around her shoulder. “I’m glad you’re here, too.”

For now, that would be enough.

**Author's Note:**

> Follow me on tumblr: forgivenessishardforus


End file.
